Alien Hominid

by 03 Entertainment

Product Features

• Battle your way through 16 levels that overflow with enemies armed to the teeth
• Collect seven different weapons, from a standard blaster to grenades -- then charge your shots for a big ball of destruction
• For more defensive gaming, players can dig into the ground and wait for enemies to come by -- then pull them under to ride them, bite their heads or throw them
• Play a selection of great mini-games -- over 200 PDA Games for 1 to 4 players
• Create your own levels and save them to a memory card, to share with your friends

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000678MB6
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches ; 4 ounces
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: November 2004
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,684 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

Alien Hominid combines classic shooter action with 2D side-scrollers and great-looking, basic graphics for a seriously fun gaming experience. In this shooter, the tables are turned -- you're an alien shooting it out against and army of humans. Fight to survive by using the right weapons and your digging skills, and live to make it back it home!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A new take on the run-and-gun genre, November 23, 2004

By 

S. Tang - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Alien Hominid (CD-ROM)

This game is highly reminiscent of other run-and-gun games, such as the original Contra (NES version, not PS2 version), Metal Slug 3, and Gunstar Heroes.

The game is an expanded version of the Flash game that originated from newgrounds.com. There are more levels, more power-ups, and a few new manuevers your alien can do. The game also allows 2-player simultaneous play. The gameplay is not exactly the same as the Flash game. If you played the Flash game and didn't like it, then this game probably won't change your mind. If you liked the Flash game and hungered for more carnage, this game is your cup of tea.

There are 16 sections, divided over 3 levels (i.e. 1-1, 1-2, etc.) The sections are pretty long. You do actually get to run around and shoot before you get to a boss. There are two stages where you fly a spaceship around in the sky and blast other flying things.

The game is as hard as they come. Even on the lowest setting, expect to die often until you learn boss patterns and how to fully use your alien's manuevers. There is a lot of explosions and destruction, that you might find it hard to see enemy bullets. There are also instances where the game is so hard, you might think the game has "cheap deaths." As far as I can tell after playing the game through several times, none of the situations are unavoidable, but they are *very hard to avoid*. If your timing or memorization is off in those situations, you will die.

To counteract the hard difficulty, the extra life system is pretty generous. You can get several extra lives in one section or at the end of the section. In addition, the game will save each section you clear, so you can pick up where you left off.

Fortunately, in 2-player mode, you can set independent difficulty levels for each player. This does not change the AI, but the amount of damage you do, number of player lives, and number of continues. It can help bring a newbie into the game while giving the veteran a bit more challenge.

The only thing I wish this game had was more grenades. Grenade restock items are rare.

After you are done with the main game, there are a few mini-games. You have to unlock all of them except the PDA

-Pinata fight: Shoot a moving pinata balloon and the stage 1 mini-boss for candy. Winner is one who collects the most candy by the end of the time limit. 2-player

-Neutron ball: A one-on-one game to get a ball into your basket. Watch out. You and your opponent can knife each other to temporarily make you drop the ball. 2-player. This isn't that much fun since you end up stabbing each other to get control of the ball, and you can't shoot. It gets repetitive.

-Super Soviet Missle "Mastar": This is an Atari 2600-inspired game. Get a travelling missile to hit an map icon of the U.S. You can only move up and down (no left or right) to avoid flying objects. Touching anything other than the U.S. icon means your missile is destroyed. You can also miss the U.S. icon too. You get 3 missiles total. As you continuing hitting the U.S. icon, the distance to impact gets longer. That is your high score. 1-player.

-Challenge: You select one of 3 locales from the game. You choose one-on-one or cooperative. The game will give you an objective. It's usually either survival (who can last the longest and score the most with limited lives) or get X number of points with limited lives.

-PDA games: This is the default mini-game. 200 one-screen puzzle levels featuring stick figures! These are pretty challenging levels, including some that if you make a mistake, you cannot complete the level (don't worry, there is a "suicide reset" to allow you to restart the level at the cost of one life).

After you are done with that, there is a level editor to allow you to make your own levels, that you can save to the memory card and take over to somebody else's console.

This game retails at $30 and is a lot better value than Neo Contra, which retails at $40.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent fun!, March 5, 2005

By 

Lisa Shea "medieval swordfighting enthusiast" - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Alien Hominid (CD-ROM)

The Hominid game was originally a flash game on the web, that developed a loyal following. Now it has become a full fledged PS2 game!

Gameplay is brilliant. You are a yellow space-alien with two antennae, that can choose from a variety of hats. If you're playing multi-player, try to choose VERY different hat styles so you do not get confused. This is a side-scrolling platformer where you move along from left to right, killing FBI, Soviet Russians and anyone else who gets in your path.

This is a ton of mindless fun. You blast away, riding in cars, flying in spaceships, running on your feet, generally shooting anything that shows up in your path. The game is VERY gory, even though it is cel-shaded. You can bash off peoples' heads, slice them with lasers, even throw them into chippers. If you're not a gore fan, turn that off - and you get a bouquet of yellow flowers insetad.

Be warned, this game doesn't start off easy. Even the beginning bosses are a challenge. But the gameplay is so much fun that you don't mind, and soon you are deep into the hack and slash mayhem. The whole game is tongue-in-cheek, with shops such as 'steakery cakery', 'gass pass' and 'grease glob'.

In addition to the regular gameplay, which is quite addictive, there are a ton of mini-games such as a soccer style game, a missile-against-US game and even a little line-drawing platformer that comes complete with a level editor.

The little touches in this game are just brilliant. You can delve underground just like a Zergling, and then when someone walks over you, you can suck them down and eat them. There are fun weapons to play with, and the list of enemies you face are quite hilarious.

Highly recommended!

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This game rules!, November 23, 2004

By 

Wade Fulp (Perkasie, PA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Alien Hominid (CD-ROM)

It's great to see a traditional 2D game again! This was a fun game to play on Newgrounds.com, but now it's much improved with better game play and graphics! There are many challenging levels and you will be sure to get your money out of this game!